New York City Center 2017 Encores! Off-Center Season

The New York City Center 2017 Encores! Off-Center Artistic Director Michael Friedman has now announced his inaugural season for the popular summer series of classic musicals, reinvented for modern audiences. The 2017 season will open with Stephen Sondheim & John Weidman's Assassins, followed by Kirsten Childs' The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin, and will conclude with Carole King & Maurice Sendak's Really Rosie.

Mr. Friedman released the following statement:

"This season might be called 'Grownups with guns, kids with dreams, and a bubbly girl trying to find her way through America.' Planning the fifth Off-Center season, I found myself asking: What kind of America do we have?, and What kind of America do we want?, and How can we possibly imagine getting there? These three shows bring with them three very different visions of the American dream and what happens when people try to make their visions real. They exemplify the variety of shows that we do at City Center. They also exemplify the reasons that musical theater matters in the first place."

Directed by Anne Kauffman, Assassins will run from July 12 to 15, 2017.

Synopsis: "A carnival ride through the history of political violence, Sondheim and Weidman's 1990 musical Assassins looks right into the heart of American anger, providing a series of showstoppers for a gallery of U.S. presidential assassins ranging from John Wilkes Booth to Lee Harvey Oswald to Lynette 'Squeaky' Fromme."

This will be followed by a special two-night-only engagement of Kirsten Childs' The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin on July 26 and 27, 2017.

Synopsis: "Kirsten Childs' autobiographical show The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin follows a young woman from Los Angeles as she finds her way from dutiful suburban daughter to Broadway dancer, all while navigating the politics of race and gender on a journey to find her own identity."

Finally to conclude the season, Leigh Silverman will direct Really Rosie, running from August 2 to 5, 2017 at New York City Center. The family-friendly musical combines the creative efforts of Carole King and Maurice Sendak - the creative genius minds behind Beautiful - The Carole King Musical and "Where the Wild Things Are," respectively.

Synopsis: "Really Rosie is a classic work for the whole family by two of the most popular artists of the 20th century: Carole King and Maurice Sendak. This sweet, sad, wonderful 1980 musical is about a little girl in Brooklyn with a big imagination. Can her dreams come true, or does growing up mean letting go? Inspired in part by the stories in Sendak's Nutshell Library, Really Rosie's songs include 'Pierre,' 'Alligators All Around,' and 'Chicken Soup with Rice.'

Casting information for all three musical revivals will be released at a later date.